Wednesday 29th April 2009
PH Fleet: Focus ST-2
Our Focus may be a one letter shift from the car of the moment, the Focus RS, but it's beating the competition in the PH car park
Someone sneaked a C30 into shot
You could be forgiven for thinking that now the RS has exploded into our lives the Focus ST is no longer quite so ‘hot’ in the hatch market. But even though its new sibling has been trained by Jet Li and spent several years in the gym, the ST can still fight with the top hatches. And it’s not the engine alone that makes the ST competitive, because the chassis is still one of the best I have driven.
Another contender for the sophisticated hot hatch title appeared in the PH car park recently - the Volvo C30 2.5 T5 R-Design. The C30 shares the same engine as the ST, albeit with a reported 4 more horses than its Ford group stablemate, producing 226bhp. This should be the Focus ST’s Siamese twin, yet something strange happened when they were separated at birth.
C30 rear seats - room for one more?
The ST produces a bellowing noise from somewhere deep inside its bowels; despite regular feeds of petrol it sounds mean and thirsty, urging its occupants quickly to the next fill-up. The C30 seems to have given up its growling bowl to the ST during separation, as the noise just isn’t there. You can hear it slightly through the funky Swedish designed centre console, but it is muffled. It is very much like the sound inside the S-Max we ran earlier, which also shared the same engine and the same promise of greater aural pleasures. The C30 leaves you feeling slightly removed from the driving experience knowing what fun your ears could be having, and the sound is not my only disappointment.
The C30 looks are an acquired taste and to be honest I love the fact it has a different design to many other hatches, but driving one squanders my affection. The ST has a chassis that talks to you, giving you confidence to push that little harder, be it on track or spirited B-roads. The Volvo doesn’t have that same poise on the road, the front end in a permanent fight to decide who is actually driving the car. Without the ability to turn off traction control you are resigned to letting the car sort itself before you regain control to power off in the direction you want.
The C30 does have one ace to trump the ST. The seating position in the Volvo is better than the Focus, a lower seat means you feel like the car is fitted around you. It still isn’t as low as I would like, but a welcome change after the sit-on-top feel of the ST. The rest of the cabin in the C30 would struggle to fit your 5-a-side football team, with very little space on the bucketed rear seats for the goalie.
The C30 is not a bad car - it just isn’t the Focus ST. Ours is currently proving hard to beat, although when an RS turns up in the PH car park I’m expecting to have to change my mind!
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robert_raw
Original Poster
78 posts
61 months
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I must admit, i do love the look of the Volvo, would love to have one colour coded white with white alloys.
Getting my first ever ford this weekend though, so i might become a focus fan over the next few months.
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FlashBastd
251 posts
59 months
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Volvo seem to have completely squandered the greatness of the Focus chassis on all of their Focus based variants, C30, S40, V50, C70, which is a real disappointment. By all accounts the Mazda 3 also lacks the excellence of the Focus.
An S40 / V50 which really capitalised on the Focus chassis could almost be a credible competitor for the A4 / 3 Series.
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John.
185 posts
62 months
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My mate who is a technician for Ford says they use a pipe which runs from the engine bay into the cabin somewhere to increase engine noise.
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cs02rm0
9,323 posts
60 months
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I bought a sea gray ST-3 a few weeks ago, absolutely loving it.
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GPT
1,170 posts
49 months
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RacingPete said: The ST produces a bellowing noise from somewhere deep inside its bowels; despite regular feeds of petrol it sounds mean and thirsty, urging its occupants quickly to the next fill-up All at once I lift off, feel the tail step wide, give it a dab of oppo and I'm away. The Focus ST was a b  h, and I spanked it.
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Jessop
390 posts
63 months
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John. said: My mate who is a technician for Ford says they use a pipe which runs from the engine bay into the cabin somewhere to increase engine noise. sounds like something to add extra WEIGHT to the car.. Has anybody actually properly stripped down an ST and weight all the crap in there its unreal
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The Milfman
1,088 posts
58 months
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I believe the C30 is so much better looking.
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jet1987
29 posts
65 months
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Very true about the pipe which makes the engine sound louder. Its a real pain when the pipe becomes slightly loose and rattles ontop of the engine!
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matmoxon
2,703 posts
87 months
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Good to see you are still enjoing it, I love mine to bits, despite the odd niggle here and there, though I think it may soon be time to Mountune it  Matt
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jet1987
29 posts
65 months
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matmoxon said: Good to see you are still enjoing it, I love mine to bits, despite the odd niggle here and there, though I think it may soon be time to Mountune it Matt They are cracking cars! Should be getting a dreamscience soon for mine!
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RacingPete
6,187 posts
73 months
PH Tech Boss Bloke
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GPT said: RacingPete said: The ST produces a bellowing noise from somewhere deep inside its bowels; despite regular feeds of petrol it sounds mean and thirsty, urging its occupants quickly to the next fill-up All at once I lift off, feel the tail step wide, give it a dab of oppo and I'm away. The Focus ST was a b h, and I spanked it. And I can now retire as my Queef level is at an all time high... 
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Lil' Joe
1,476 posts
55 months
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ST owners, what is your MPG coming in at? Quite fancy one but not if its doing circa 20mpg. It not that nice a car that I'll accept minus 20 odd...that's ridiculous.
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matmoxon
2,703 posts
87 months
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Lil' Joe said: ST owners, what is your MPG coming in at? Quite fancy one but not if its doing circa 20mpg. It not that nice a car that I'll accept minus 20 odd...that's ridiculous. Depends how you drive it, I went down from Hull to Luton and back last year and it averaged 30mpg for the trip, average of 67mph according to the trip computer, that was sedate driving though more of a constant 50 to 80mph trundle, no hard driving. Day to day if you do allot of town driving it will be horrendous 20mpg or less. I do more of a combined run too and from work (22 miles for the round trip), mixture of town and NSL single carriage way and dual carriage way, it varies between 22 and 25mpg. Out for a hoon, don't expect more than high teens. Re-set the MPG meter every fill up as it takes a continuous average. Matt
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MoonMonkey
1,182 posts
82 months
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Lil' Joe said: ST owners, what is your MPG coming in at? Quite fancy one but not if its doing circa 20mpg. It not that nice a car that I'll accept minus 20 odd...that's ridiculous. 27'ish mpg average over 18k miles.
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toohey30
10 posts
57 months
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From the centre of norwich to the airport - back and forth over the last tank it did 22.9mpg ..... and i'm not the most eco friendly of drivers! On the motorway it seems to get a better mpg if i go slightly faster than the the limit, best on a long journey - aberdeen to taunton - 32.9mpg. Also think that the computer under reads slightly - by doing a full tank to full tank calc (litres used) i got a better figure than the computer said i was doing by about 2mpg....... if your only doing 20 thats 10%!!
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RacingPete
6,187 posts
73 months
PH Tech Boss Bloke
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Lil' Joe said: ST owners, what is your MPG coming in at? Quite fancy one but not if its doing circa 20mpg. It not that nice a car that I'll accept minus 20 odd...that's ridiculous. The PH Fleet car has not seen north of 30MPG much except when we lent it to one of the Events girls and it came back with 31.5, so not sure what she did with it. I get around 22mpg regardless of how I drive it, and I certainly don't have an economic thought... if you haven't read it I did mention some MPG stuff in this report http://www.pistonheads.com/news/default.asp?storyI...You would have to drive flat out in 1st gear everywhere to see under 20mpg as not a figure I have seen even with the commute across London
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collateral
6,851 posts
87 months
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It'd come down to a choice between the ST dynamics or the better looks of the Swede for me.
I wonder if Ford are going to raid the Volvo derv parts bin and bring out a GTD rival?
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huggyST
65 posts
55 months
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20MPG at best for mine but nearly all town driving.
Also currently for sale
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Defcon
1,211 posts
59 months
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collateral said: It'd come down to a choice between the ST dynamics or the better looks of the Swede for me.
I wonder if Ford are going to raid the Volvo derv parts bin and bring out a GTD rival? Clarkson joke incoming in 3...2...1...
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ChapppeRS
3,513 posts
60 months
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John. said: My mate who is a technician for Ford says they use a pipe which runs from the engine bay into the cabin somewhere to increase engine noise. Indeed. It's called a symposer. It's an air take off from the airbox which vibrates a diaphragm fitted into the bulkhead behind the dash. Basically a mini speaker resonated by the induction. Don't think it weighs much though!
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